OMotM / LCotM Spotlight: Battlefields + Full Potential

By kenn. Released: 2025/07/19.
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OMotM Spotlight Art

Art by anundeadboy.

What is an OMotM/LCotM?

The OMotM, or Other Metagame of the Month, is the metagame that is voted by the players to have a ladder for a specific month. The LCotM, or Leader's Choice of the Month, is a second ladder that is chosen specifically by OM Forum Mods. For the most part, the LCotM is a metagame that needs more love, as it may not be able to compete with the others that get nominated for the OMotM voting.

For July, the OMotM is Battlefields, while the Leader's Choice is Full Potential!

Introduction to Battlefields

Have you always wondered what it would be like if Game Freak decided to keep permanent weather around after generation five? Well wonder no more because Battlefields is the OM you're looking for. Battlefields aims to throw it back to the good ole days by not just making weather permanent again, but almost every field effect that is available in Scarlet and Violet.

The field effects in question are Terrains, Wide Guard, weather, Gravity, Rooms, Safeguard, Mist, and Magnetic Flux. In fact, two notable field effects, Trick Room and Tailwind, have already been given the banhammer just due to how much they offered to and warped the metagame. This enables a lot of unique strategies when it comes to not only making progress, but when trying to combat whatever strategies your opponent may bring to the table! In fact, moves like Ice Spinner and the weather moves themselves see more use if only to guarantee that the opponent's Terrain is nullified or that the weather of choice is the permanent one.

Threats in Battlefields

  • Pelipper
  • Pelipper @ Heavy-Duty Boots Heavy-Duty Boots
  • Ability: Drizzle
  • Tera Type: Steel
  • EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpD
  • Relaxed Nature
  • IVs: 0 Spe
  • - Weather Ball
  • - Hurricane
  • - Rain Dance
  • - U-turn
  • Torkoal
  • Torkoal @ Heavy-Duty Boots Heavy-Duty Boots
  • Ability: Drought
  • Tera Type: Dragon / Water
  • EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 8 SpA
  • Bold Nature
  • - Lava Plume
  • - Body Press
  • - Rapid Spin
  • - Stealth Rock

Weather as a whole is just as potent as it was way back in generation five. Both of these setters provide some form of support alongside the rain or sun that their abilities provide. Specifically, Pelipper can pivot slowly into major threats such as Iron Bundle and Ogerpon-W. Furthermore, Torkoal can provide role compression, offering up entry hazards in the form of Stealth Rock and entry hazard removal in the form of Rapid Spin, all while being more consistent at ridding your side of the field thanks to the ability to run Heavy-Duty Boots with sun being permanently active so long as another weather doesn't override it.

Rillaboom

This guy ain't monkeying around; permanent Grassy Terrain makes Rillaboom a consistent damage threat, in addition to offsetting Life Orb recoil. High Horsepower nails Steel-types that resist its Grass-type STAB moves. Usually, you will see Rillaboom paired with other Grass-types such as Meowscarada to beef up their own Grass-type STAB moves or with Galarian Weezing, whose Neutralizing Gas ability can be particularly useful in keeping up Grassy Terrain without it being interrupted from the other automatic Terrain setters.

Dragapult

Funnily enough, standard Dragapult works excellently here thanks to its ability to use Infiltrator to its fullest. Being a fast pivot is particularly useful, as switch-ins will not be able to have their weather or Terrain to be up because Dragapult can swap into a teammate that will override the foe's automatic weather or Terrain setter with one of its own. Dragapult can even see use against bulkier teams thanks to Infiltrator bypassing Safeguard, allowing for consistent mixed attacking value.

Introduction to Full Potential

Full Potential is an OM that got its start back in generation seven as a reimagined version of Got Talent, which was an OM back in generation six that used contest categories to determine what stat a move would use when attacking, however contests were non-existent in generation seven and hence Full Potential was born!

This OM is unique in that a Pokemon attacks using its highest calculated stat, or HCS, barring HP, rather just their Attack or Special Attack stats. This means an item like Assault Vest acts sort of like a Choice item would so long as a Pokemon's Special Defense is their HCS, while moves like Amnesia, Iron Defense, and Shift Gear are just like Swords Dance and Nasty Plot for their respective stats. This also means Pokemon tend to be mixed attackers, as the move's category is no longer shackled by biased offensive stats, and defensive Pokemon can deal much higher damage than usual. Furthermore, stat-lowering moves like Draco Meteor effectively have no drawback and are much more spammable. With an offensive metagame such as this one, Pokemon thrive on being able to either pivot in and out with ease or setting up and just tanking whatever comes their way.

Threats in Full Potential

Meowscarada

Meowscarada is one of the fastest Pokemon that excels at not only firing off powerful attacks, but it also provides team support by ridding foes of their Eviolite, Assault Vest, or Heavy-Duty Boots with Knock Off. It also provides Spikes, which is a pretty rare sight in the meta overall and takes advantage of most users dropping Heavy-Duty Boots for the power boosting items available, allowing chip damage to accrue on foes and wear them down to secure KOs without the need for boosting itself. The choice in what STAB moves to pick depends on what the team needs, as Flower Trick can power through Defense-boosting Pokemon, but comes at the cost of power over Leaf Storm and running the weaker Dark Pulse to stay attacking on both sides.

Comfey

Comfey is a really unique Pokemon thanks to it having an amazing Special Defense stat coupled with decent Speed. Amnesia gives it the opportunity to boost its Special Defense even further, all backed by STAB-boosted priority in Draining Kiss. Having priority allows it to potentially nail faster threats such as Meowscarada as well. Knock Off is probably the most potent it has ever been in a meta thanks to not only hitting hard, but ridding Pokemon of Assault Vest, one of the most prominent items in Full Potential, which not only weakens foes' attacks, but allows Comfey to hit super hard with Draining Kiss and Giga Drain. Encore and Taunt both provide disruption for setup sweepers that try to boost alongside Comfey so it can win the 1v1.

Dusclops

Eviolite in Full Potential gives NFE Pokemon a chance to shine, as they receive a 1.5x boost to all attacks so long as their Defense or Special Defense is their HCS. Dusclops makes for an excellent example thanks to having a massive 130 Defense and Special Defense, facilitating both good bulk and high Poltergeist damage. Having access to Shadow Sneak is huge, as Dusclops can just offset its abysmal Speed to pick weakened threats off with ease. Dusclops is also very versatile in what it can run as coverage, but Brick Break is the preferred choice, as it nails Cyclizar, which would otherwise take anything Dusclops throws at it, as well as providing perfect neutral coverage alongside its Ghost-type STAB moves. Trick Room is also a good option thanks to Dusclops being so slow naturally and can provide that support to some of its slower teammates.

Final Thoughts

No matter which one of these OMs pique your interest, make sure you go out there on that battlefield and reach your full potential! Also, be sure to join us in the Other Metagames Discord and the Other Metagames room on Pokemon Showdown! to discuss, learn, and play these metagames and all of the others we have to offer! Enjoy the Battlefields and Full Potential ladders for the rest of July!

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